The present invention relates to a cylinder head and combustion chamber sealing arrangement for a reciprocating piston engine. The sealing arrangement is subdivided into a sealing element in the cylinder liner region, and a sealing element in the cylinder block region, with both sealing elements being made of solid metal. The sealing element in the liner area (combustion chamber seal) is disposed in a recess in the liner collar, which is supported on he cylinder block. This recess opens radially outwardly and adjoins a so-called fire prevention collar or raised edge. The sealing element is stressed in a certain range beyond the Yield limit of the material by tightening the cylinder head screws, with the yielding process, linked to the deformation of the sealing element, being limited by the thickness of the sealing element in the cylinder block area, and by the extent to which the base surface of the liner-collar recess is lower than the end face of the cylinder block.
A combustion chamber sealing arrangement o this general type is described in applicants' copending U.S. patent application Ser. No. 028,602, filed Mar. 20, 1987, now U.S. Pat. No. 4,791,891. With this arrangement, only the sealing region in the vicinity of the raised portion on the sealing collar of the cylinder liner is stressed beyond the yield limit of the material, with the free deformability of the sealing region in the vicinity of the raised portion, in other words the yield effect, being adversely affected by the supporting action of the adjoining inner and outer ring-shaped sealing parts beyond the actual seal-raised portion-support area, these sealing parts not being directly loaded.
It is therefore an object of the present invention to further improve the cylinder head and combustion chamber sealing arrangement of the aforementioned general type.